


accipiter gentilis (noble hawk)

by Wolf2407



Series: Starhawk (and Sons) et al. [2]
Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other, PTSD, battle slaves, in which stakar and aleta adopt a blue son to go with their glittery son, recovery from being raised by the goddamn kree, references to cannibalism, slavery and the consequences thereof
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-18 22:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13109793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wolf2407/pseuds/Wolf2407
Summary: alternatively titled "The Hawk and the Abyss"What is love, to one who does not have a name?What is beauty, to one who has never looked for it?The story of the relationship between Yondu, Stakar and Aleta, from beginning to end. From Yondu's perspective.(Occurs concurrently with Part One of Starhawk & Sons; can be read independently without also reading 'falco peregrinus pealei'.)





	accipiter gentilis (noble hawk)

**Author's Note:**

> The northern goshawk is a medium-sized 'true' hawk, ranging across the northern hemisphere. Birds that live in the far north will migrate south in the fall, often traveling along mountain ranges. 
> 
> They are noted for their blood-red eyes when mature, their agility, and their extreme bloodlust.
> 
> Chapter title taken from the song 'O Death', the Ralph Stanley version.
> 
> Death and salvation both come on swift wings.  
> (Wait, aren't they the same thing?)

There were hawks on Centauri-IV.  
  
They came in various colors, and in various sizes. In the mountains, they perched on what little stunted trees grew on the rocks, watching with sharp eyes and sharper beaks for abandoned carcasses or the scuttling of cliff-mice. Their voices were low barks and cackles when they spoke to each other, nothing like the musical whistling of the songbirds that was close to the lilting cadences of Centaurian speech.  
  
The hawks always came in closer when the clan hunters had made a kill, and would challenge the smaller children for the bones. Later, when the famine came, they challenged the adults for the children.  
  
When the Kree came, their language sounded close to the hawk-song, close enough that the youngest ones wondered if they were from a tribe that had chosen to emulate them.  
  
After the Kree left, there was no room for questions, no room for the delicate trills that sang of the legacy of the jungle-birds. The hawksong of Kree-Lar replaced it, and eventually, even the memory of the hawks faded, until there was only Kree-Lar, with its guttural, rhythm-free _this one_ instead of _I,_ with _by Hala’s glory_ instead of _in Anthos’ name._  
  
So, too, did the memories of snow fade, until it seemed that there had never been anything but the sand-pits. White was not a color that lasted long in the pits and pens; the world was the grey of a cage’s bars, the black of a fighter’s collar, the pale gold sand.  
  
Blood came in a hundred colors, blue and purple and grey and red and black and everything else, almost beautiful as it darkened the earth.  
  
  
_*_  
  
  
The Empire wasn’t picky.  
  
There were no particular requirements for admittance to the slave-pens. The balance of things shifted, back and forth, as the warfront pushed further into or out of Nova territory. One week a band of Krylorians came through, and a small group of A’askavarii the next. The A’askavarii lasted longer than the Krylorians, but most of them not by much. The Masters were particularly excited when a collection of Xandarians came through, and took great joy in them.  
  
The one branded with the number _79144672_ watched them come, watch them go, and remained.  
  
There were no requirements to enter the pens, but there was one to stay.  
  
_Survive._  
  
And so it did.  
  
  
_**  
  
_  
“Where do you think the dead ones go?”  
  
The one branded _79144672_ \- although it was often simply addressed as _791,_ now, since most of its peers had sequences starting with _80_ or higher- looked at the other one out of the corner of its eye.  
  
“What does that one think they feed these ones?” 791 asked, waving a hand at their compatriots in the pen. It gritted its teeth, steel caps grinding against each other. Referring to one with _you_ a precious honor, and a whippable offense if done to a peer, for both parties.  
  
The other one shifted, sensing the motion but not able to see it in the pitch dark. “Not that way,” the other said, and the air in the room felt slightly electric as fourteen sets of ears tuned in on the whispered conversation. “This one meant… the not-body, of the body.”  
  
791 squinted. “Explain.”  
  
“This one means the part of the body that is not physical,” the other explained. “That which goes away when one sleeps and comes back when one awakes.”  
  
“The _káta,”_ piped in another voice, bright with enlightenment.  
  
“The _szrezyo,”_ added another, lower in pitch.  
  
 The newest one- referred to as 586 as none of its current peers had that in their end sequence- cleared its throat. _“I_ think-“  
  
The pen lit up with the sound of hisses and curses, like a pit of vipers. The three closest to 586 clawed and beat at it, making it yelp sharply.  
  
_“Make it quiet!”_ snarled 791’s first conversational companion.  
  
There was a dull, wet _crunch_ as 586’s head was slammed into the floor. It whimpered slightly, and then did not speak.  
  
791 inhaled, smelled blood, and tilted its head, intrigued at the prospect of fresh meat.  
  
“See that one,” the other said. “It had something that it now does not have. Where did it go?”  
  
791 passed its tongue over its teeth, and was almost grateful for the caps; they _did_ give it an advantage in fights.  
  
“This one does not know,” 791 replied, listening to the wet ripping sound of skin being torn away.  
  
“This one thinks that where the _káta_ goes, there are no masters,” the first interrupter postulated. “There is no pain. There is no hunger.”  
  
_That does not help here,_ 791 thought, and began to make its way to the body.  
  
  
_**_  
  
  
Many died in the pens. Some were consumed by the starving hordes the way 586 had been. Others took a wound and lost their minds to infection, step by step, until they were left babbling nonsense in a thousand languages that were meant to be spoken under any sky besides Hala’s. Some cried out for family, at the end, while others sang prayers to something that lived in the same place the lost not-bodies did.  
  
Many more died in the sand pits, where blood turned gold to black.  
  
Often, if they came in fresh when they were too old, they would lay down and refuse to eat their rations. Their brands would weep with pus, and their flesh would wither until the Overseers came and forced tubes down their throats.  
  
If they fought the tube, their teeth were taken. It happened once, to one of 791’s penmates; it had simply curled up in the corner, weeping, holding its mouth open so that nothing touched the jagged shards of its teeth. Blood dripped from its mouth, and it whimpered through the night.  
  
On the second night, its penmates ate it alive for the sake of preserving their small bit of peace.  
  
  
_*_  
  
  
The day came in the pit, when 791 was set against the last remaining A’askavarian. They had fought for long enough for the sun to travel partway across the sky, the A’askavarian’s armor on its body too thick for the arrow to pierce, so 791 had had to make do with slicing away at its tentacles.  
  
One bite, surely, meant death, not only from the teeth but the bacteria and poison carried in the saliva. So 791 circled, with no armor of its own, and stayed out of reach.  
  
Until a sharp buzzer sounded.  
  
791 looked up at the ringside spectating seats; one of the Overseers threw down a spear that lodged itself into the sand.  
  
“Finish it,” the Overseer commanded.  
  
791 wrenched the spear from the earth. It was still a small creature, still young, still a child by most planets’ reckonings at not even ten standard cycles old, and so it held the spear with no great deal of grace.  
  
It focused on the weak point in the armor- the underside of the jaw, to give the creature free range of motion to bite- and lunged.  
  
The A’askavarian screamed and flailed as it died, the way all things did.  
  
And its teeth lodged in the edge of the fin that ran along 791’s head.  
  
They dug into the bone, but the power to break through it was gone, lost when the not-body left the body of the beast. The pain was immeasurable.  
  
Distantly, as if through a fog, it could hear speech.  
  
“The High Masters want this one saved. They think it’ll make a good Frontliner one day.”  
  
_There are antidotes,_ 791 thought. _They will give this one a treatment, and make it pay it off later._  
  
That was fair.  
  
The sound it made when the A’askavarian’s head was pulled belonged to a nonsentient creature. There was a terrible _popping_ sensation as the teeth were wrenched free.  
  
“Take it to Medical,” the Overseer ordered. “Tell them to do whatever they feel is appropriate. High Master Reyto has some ideas that should already be in their computers.”  
  
791 was not particularly aware of the journey. Black blood- Kree and Centaurians bled the same color- dripped down its face. A fiery burning gnawed at the wounds in its fin, ever-so-slowly beginning to spread out from the bite marks.  
  
In Medical, they put it in a headstall, the bars of the cage digging slightly into its head. The center of the cage along the top of its skull was open, for holding species with crests. A metal plate pressed on 791’s tongue, preventing it from speaking, or whistling. The bottom of the cage hooked onto the collar, the whole assembly attached to the floor in a way that forced the one in it to kneel.  
  
“A’askavarii bite?” the doctor asked, pinching the fin and pulling on it side-to-side; 791’s cries were choked by the gag.  
  
“Not twenty minutes ago,” 791’s handler said. “Venom shouldn’t have gotten too far, no?”  
  
“Not at all.” The doctor turned to a computer. “I’m surprised they had you bring it here at all. It’d make good food for the ones in the cages tonight.”  
  
The handler snorted. “It wasn’t my idea, sir.”  
  
“Of course not.” The doctor hummed thoughtfully. “Reyto has some interesting ideas on what should be done with this one, though. He thinks the fin should be taken out, replaced with an implant. He’s willing to finance the procedure so long as he gets this one’s title.”  
  
Taken out-  
  
_No. No. No._  
  
“This one will be fine,” 791 tried to say, but it came out as a mumble. It swallowed, then tried again. “This one will be fine. It swears not to disobey ever again, to dedicate every heartbeat to furthering Hala’s glory, to-“  
  
It couldn’t even understand its own speech.  
  
The handler rolled their eyes, hand going to a remote on their belt. “Shall I?”  
  
“Please do,” the doctor sighed.  
  
An electric shock passed from the collar straight into 791’s spine; it curled in on itself, teeth grinding against the gag-plate, blood filling its mouth. The bars of the headstall cut into its scalp.  
  
The doctor tightened the bolts on the cage, nearly cutting off 791’s breathing as it tried to recover. The top half of the cage cut deep into the skin, now, forcing its jaw down against the plates at the bottom of the cage, its teeth vice-tight against the gag plate. There was a sharp sting in its neck.  
  
It couldn’t move.  
  
It couldn’t blink.  
  
Its fingers refused to respond to a command, but it still felt the warm trickle of blood down its face, and now saltwater, too.  
  
_Please. Please. Please don’t. I’ll do anything-_  
  
The first pass of the saw left no room for thoughts, except for a stabbing pain somewhere deep in its body as it lost its sense of the arrow, and so much more.  
  
It was beyond pain, beyond agony, beyond words to describe, beyond the capacity of a mind to bear. 791 could only stare blankly ahead.  
  
Inside, it howled in the way of beasts.  
  
Seconds stretched into eternities, each containing the full sum of time since the dawn of the universe, and filled with all its suffering. When the first cut was done, a second followed that took the fin at a line flush with 791’s scalp and spine.  
  
It thought, for a moment, that it was over.  
  
Then something whirred.  
  
“I have to get all of the tissue out,” the doctor explained to the overseer. “It’s still young enough that it could regrow. And I need to make space for Reyto’s implant.”  
  
“Do what you need to do. It’s not my place to decide.”  
  
“It isn’t,” the doctor agreed, something clicking on whatever they were holding in their hand. “But I figured you might like to have something to tell your superiors when they ask you about what I did.”  
  
And then something dug into the open wound, tearing and sanding away the flesh there. The vibrations from it passed down through 791’s skull, causing a slight reverberation in the cage.  
  
Somewhere, in the passage of a thousand thousand lifetimes’ worth of time, 791 simply… _disconnected._ Its consciousness hid away in some corner of its mind, reeling at the horror, and it registered reality as a dim awareness of the light and of the horrific grinding sound of bone being stripped away.  
  
It felt, barely, the mount for the implant being bolted to its skull, wires being coupled together, and then the glass pane on top was fitted into place. It was the barest relief, like holding frostbitten hands over a match, when he regained awareness of the arrow. There was another sharp prick in its neck.  
  
The headstall opened, and 791 fell to the floor.  
  
Instinctively, more than anything, it scrambled to regain its feet. To stay down, in the pits or in the pens, was to die. When it stood, it swayed slightly from side to side, but stayed standing.  
  
“You’re going to need some new remotes,” the doctor advised the handler, and passed him a rod. “Here, try this one. Hold the button and ask it a question.”  
  
791 hung its head, and so didn’t see the handler’s expression, but they made an intrigued sound.  
  
“What is that one feeling?” the handler asked.  
  
_Ready and able,_ 791 opened its mouth to say, because that was _always_ the answer, no matter how untrue it was.  
  
“Pain without peer,” 791 murmured instead, mentally reeling and physically incapable of anything but the truth. “Exhaustion. Hunger.”  
  
_“Fascinating,”_ the handler breathed.  
  
“You’ll _really_ like this one,” the doctor said. “Flip the safety here, and then run through these switches.”  
  
With no internal command, 791’s head snapped to the left, then the right. With a dull, raw fear and horror, it watched its fingers twitch and curl of their own accord.  
  
“Press that button there,” the doctor advised.  
  
791, again, fell to the floor. For a moment, nothing responded to its own will, and then it once again regained its feet.  
  
They laughed, and it took _much_ more than that before they were satisfied.  
  
  
_*_  
  
  
After, they put it in a solitary cage instead of back in one of the group pens. It was an unexpected loss, the lack of others to brace against for warmth at night. More, there was something profoundly _missing_ from the world now, in the way it could no longer sense the scuttling of the mice and rats along the floor, or tell where the purest water trickled down the walls by intuitively _knowing_ where the moss grew.  
  
There was no room to walk in the cage, not even enough to stand. Time lost meaning, for a while, punctuated by the irregular delivery of rations and the sharp sting of a syringe full of _something._  
  
Eventually, one of the Overseers came, with a taller man accompanying him.  
  
“As you see, it is doing quite well,” the Overseer said. 791 squinted slightly; the new man looked thoughtful (and _important,_ what with his heavy robes accented with silver armor plates) as he squatted in front of the cage. “We’ve been able to keep the infection at bay, and there’s no signs of rejection.”  
  
“Excellent,” the man murmured, and purple eyes met red. “Do you think it’s ready to go back in the ring?”  
  
“In another few days, it will be.”  
  
“Good.” The man straightened. “Has my mark been put on it yet?”  
  
“Not yet, sir. We were waiting for your word.”  
  
“Have it done.”  
  
“It will be taken care of, High Master.”  
  
  
_**_  
  
  
Days bled into weeks, weeks bled into years, years blurred into an eternal mental night, and an odd _numbness_ washed the day-to-day down to a routine where the outside world felt like something a thousand lightyears away.  
  
791 saw much, and remembered most, but chose not to think about it.  
  
The pits were profitable, for those who bet on them. The ones who tended to win, thus accrued value, and so it happened that Reyto wasn’t the last family name branded on 791’s back.  
  
It got its first frontlining job four years after it got the implant. Often, the worst performers in the ring were sent out earlier to be cannon fodder for the troops, or target practice; conversely, the very best in the ring might never see a starship except when they were sold.  
  
Frontlining was the one thing that the ones in the pens could strive for. Frontliners were given quotas, sent out on the battlefield, and then rewarded for every scalp past that quota that they brought in. Once the quota was filled, one could trade for clothes, armor, food, a bronze chit or two. Then, of course, those that had lorded themselves other those that had not.  
  
The first time 791 saw the stars, it was on an asteroid colony. The transporter they arrived in had developed a flaw that necessitated transferring ships.  
  
791 looked up, the portable headstall a familiar weight on its head, and truly saw the universe.  
  
Silver dots were scattered out in the black, layered so thickly their lights mixed into a soft glow. They numbered somewhere approaching infinity, incomprehensibly far away, a great sea that transfixed and awed.  
  
791 had no word for it, but if it could, it would have said it was they were beautiful.  
  
“This one knows a word for that,” whispered the one next to 791. It was a pale blue, with its torso terminating in a tail like a snake; gills on its ribcage fluttered with each of its breaths. Its head had a pair of thin ribbed fins in place of ears. _Jestiean,_ it had named its species once.  
  
791 looked at it, then slightly shook a shackled hand to draw attention to it.  
  
The ones in the pens and on the ships developed a rough pidgin sign language, enough to get by; no way to give oneself a name with it, but enough to indicate _this one saw, this one heard, Overseer coming, the one in purple armor is cruel._  
  
<What?> 791 signed.  
  
_“Yondu,”_ the other confided. “It means the night sky, when nothing else blocks you from it and that one sees its true shape.”  
  
<This?> 791 gestured up.  
  
“Yes,” the other finished, straightening as an Overseer came closer. “This.”  
  
  
_**_  
  
  
Dawn came at dusk. Liberation came from death. Hope came from despair, a beginning from an end.  
  
It started like any other frontlining mission, with the headstall being taken off just before the ship landed. There were other ships trading missiles with the ones from the Kree warship; every once in a while, there would be a jarring explosion as one on either side got shot down.  
  
It quit being normal when in the heat of battle, 791’s handler dropped the controller module.  
  
791 watched it fall. The handler watched it fall.  
  
They made eye contact.  
  
791 sent the arrow through the handler’s heart.  
  
A quick, shrill whistle sent it through the head of another handler who’d seen, and then 791 turned its attention back to the battle proper, a streak of red flashing through blue and green leather coats. And if the arrow happened to hit Kree plate armor instead of whatever faction’s leather uniforms… well, so be it. 791 just had to make it through the battle, and then _go._  
  
Where didn’t matter. What happened next didn’t matter.  
  
791 trilled softly, sending the arrow looping around its shoulder, lining up the next target- green coat, short blonde hair shaped into spikes, looked Xandarian, was giving commands and needed to be stopped- when said target turned, raised their arm, and fired their blaster.  
  
The plasma-bolt slammed into the flat top of the implant, and 791 felt it crack under the impact. It fell to the ground with a strangled sound, instinctively grasping for the arrow. It could still _feel_ it, through the all-consuming pain that came from the implant.  
  
A shadow darkened its field of view; reflexively, it whistled, and the sun returned.  
  
Kree, it turned out when the body fell- not the others. Another one of the frontliners shoved 791 aside, and cut crudely at the face and neck.  
  
Not for the scalp, no. For the meat.  
  
More out of the concept of the thing, 791 grasped the arrow tightly in its hand and slammed it into the other frontliner’s skull, the point going through bone like water. It wrenched the arrow free, then stood and got on the move again.  
  
To be still was to be dead. That was the one truth it knew.  
  
A missile hit nearby, making its ears ring; it staggered, tripping on a body, twisting an ankle, and yet-  
  
_-keep moving.  
  
_ It was getting harder to see; smoke and dust clouded the field, and the sun was going down. A faint chill started to prick at 791’s skin.  
  
An Overseer stumbled out of the dust.  
  
For a moment, they just stared at each other, both burnt out and battle-weary; the Overseer moved first, hand moving to a remote clipped to its belt. 791 bared its teeth- _it’s incompatible, it won’t do anything-_  
  
_-except for trigger the kill switch on the collar._  
  
Before 791 could whistle, the world went black.  
  
  
_*_  
  
  
When it opened its eyes, the stars were coming out.  
  
791 was pinned under the corpse of the Overseer, which was well on its way to going cold. A harsh, stabbing pain radiated out from the implant; it felt the arrow clutched in its hand, but couldn’t _sense_ it.  
  
A brief struggle made it clear there was no way out from under the Overseer; 791 was squarely pinned underneath. A pain radiated up its leg whenever it tried to move; coupled with the throbbing from the implant, which was accentuated every time a rock under it dug into the cracks, escape was impossible.  
  
791 laid still.  
  
Closed its eyes.  
  
Opened them again.  
  
Bit by bit, the starlight fought its way through the dimming sky. The field was quieter, now, the fight nearly over, shouts audible in the distance overlaying the soft murmur of the speech of many- not in Kree-Lar, but in a handful of languages recognizable from the pits- Krylorian, Xandarian, Xenosi, a few others, and another that was unfamiliar.  
  
_These ones did not win._  
  
There would be no return ship. No turning-in of scalps.  
  
A smattering of blaster fire punctuated the dusk. Putting down the wounded, 791 supposed. On both sides, surely- picking out the ones that had their cost of repair exceed their future worth, and cutting losses. To offer your enemy the same clean death was a great kindness.  
  
_There are no masters, where the dead ones go,_ the ones in the ships had sworn. _There is no pain. There is no fear, no hunger. There is nothing at all._  
  
Perhaps that wouldn’t be so bad.  
  
A star shined brighter than the others, slightly skewed from directly overhead.  
  
_The night’s true form,_ the blue Jestiean had said, hadn’t it? _When nothing separates that one from it._ That great infinity, holder of endless possibilities, giver of a _thing_ that sent a strange feeling through something that was not part of the physical body- maybe it was a shame, a small tragedy, that the dust mote of a not-body could never be a part of that, would always be slightly separate and then nothing at all?  
  
Perhaps nothingness was not so terrible, if one got to enter it from under the stars, instead of from behind the bars of a cage.  
  
No.  
  
That wouldn’t be bad at all.  
  
791 let the tension go out of its muscles, settled into the earth, pushed the pain away to a corner of its mind, and waited to die.  
  
Seven more stars had appeared when there was a soft _thump,_ off to the side- more out of instinct than will, 791 pulled the arrow close, trying to twist and see.  
  
And drew the _thing’s_ attention.  
  
Bright golden wings, their shape blunt and geometric, extended up from the shoulders of a being whose eyes glowed white like a thousand stars. It was bipedal, shaped like a Xandarian, but no Xandarian was capable of that. 791 had killed enough of them to know.  
  
Fear came back, and its teeth were sharp. 791 inhaled sharply, pressed itself further into the ground, and tried to remain unseen.  
  
_Too late._  
  
The Xandarian-that-was-not-a-Xandarian started walking towards 791. It cowered, and couldn’t seem to look away, watching as the light coming from the _thing_ dimmed until it was nothing, until the not-Xandarian looked like one. When the not-Xandarian came within ten feet of the Overseer’s corpse, they stopped, and removed their helmet, clipping it to their belt by one of the winglike fins that extended along the sides, keeping a blaster in their hand.  
  
They regarded each other. Without the helmet, the not-Xandarian looked even more like a Xandarian, if perhaps vying for the title of the oldest one 791 had ever met; their hair was a dark silver, illuminated by the glow of the golden hoops- the same wing-shape as the helm- attached to their dark blue coat in the place of pauldrons. There was a slight, displeased set to their face- they did not like what they saw.  
  
“This one is not ready,” 791 spat. “This one is not able. This one has failed in completion of its mission.”  
  
That was a death sentence. A confession earned a quick death, rather than a long one; all, in the end, told the Masters what they wanted, as one with no possessions had few secrets, but one with no skin had none.  
  
The not-Xandarian had a strange look on its face. Not anger. Not disgust. Something else.  
  
“This one understands the consequences,” 791 continued, “and is prepared to receive the punishment.”  
  
The not-Xandarian didn’t move.  
  
_Has that one lost their mind?_ “If this one was unclear, it apologizes. It is prepared to receive the punishment.”  
  
_This one is done. This one cannot carry on. This one has fought its last fight. Please. Allow this one to be finished._  
  
“With due respect,” it insisted, “this one requests that you carry it out now. This one is tired of waiting.”  
  
The Masters _hated_ being instructed. Surely, that would set off this strange not-Xandarian thing-  
  
-the not-Xandarian holstered their blaster.  
  
“I’m not going to hurt you,” the not-Xandarian said quietly, showing its open hands.  
  
_Liar,_ 791 thought.  
  
The not-Xandarian starting walking towards 791 again; it watched, near-trembling, as they closed it, and then grabbed a hold of the Overseer, throwing the body away like it weighed nothing at all.  
  
_They don’t need a weapon to kill this one,_ 791 thought, almost stunned as it quickly pulled its legs near to itself, a sharp tingling going through its lower body now that the blood could flow properly again. It couldn’t stand, not quite yet, and surely, that meant death-  
  
The not-Xandarian showed it their open hands again. “I just want to help,” they insisted. “I won’t hurt you, I promise.”  
  
791 blinked, then closed its eyes as they reached for its neck. There was a soft _clinking_ sound, a slight tug on the collar- going for the kill-switch, then. Not as kind as the blaster; the kill-switch sent an array of steel bolts straight through the neck, and it was messy, took several minutes for a Xandarian to bleed out, and it knew that because it had seen it-  
  
-there was a soft click-  
  
-the collar opened.  
  
791’s eyes snapped open; like the gasp of a drowning man, it instinctively took a deep breath as a constant, unnoticed pressure on its windpipe lifted. Its chest heaved as the not-Xandarian pulled the collar away, the halves swinging on their hinge, and the not-Xandarian quickly backed away before throwing the collar away with a snap of their wrist.  
  
791 scrambled to its feet, leaning heavily to one side, a hand on its throat, fingers tracing an uninterrupted path from jaw to collarbone for the first time. It looked at the not-Xandarian with something akin to reverence- not that it had a word for that, either.  
  
“You’re free now,” the not-Xandarian explained. “All of the others that came on that ship with you are dead. You can go your own way, take one of their fighters, if you like.”  
  
_Do not address this one that way,_ 791 wanted to snap, but didn’t, because the not-Xandarian was not one who could be corrected like that.  
  
“This one is not trained in mechanical operations,” it managed to say, still rubbing at its throat, noticing how some of the rasp had gone out of its voice, how it sounded fuller. “This one is meant for fighting. It can repay you with its services. It is a useful tool on the battlefield.”  
  
A spike of pain went through its skull from the implant. _Without the arrow, less useful. But not useless._  
  
“That won’t be necessary,” the not-Xandarian said. “I can arrange for you to be taken to your home, if you like. Where is it?”  
  
“This one has none,” 791 assured. “This one has nowhere else to go. It is a tool for using, with no distractions to lead it astray.”  
  
That strange not-anger not-disgust look was back on the not-Xandarian’s face- they were a creature of negatives, apparently.  
  
“You could come with me,” the not-Xandarian suggested. _Don’t address this one that way._ “I’m Captain Stakar Ogord, head of the Stakar Ravager Clan. You could have a place with us. There are some rules, a code to follow, but Ravagers are freer than anything else out there. So long as you follow the code, you can make a way out among the stars with us.”  
  
_Among the stars?_  
  
791 glanced up, then looked back at the not-Xandarian- _no,_ Captain Ogord.  
  
“This one is identified as seven-nine-one-four-four-six-seven-two,” it recited in an attempt to offer an equal amount of information. “And it… it would be this one’s honor to follow you.”  
  
Ogord tilted their head. “Do you have a name? From before?”  
  
There was no _before,_ not for 791. It tried to remember the convention; family name last but given first, then the individual given name…  
  
“This one’s family name was Udonta,” it offered, remembering the call of _out of the Udonta bloodline_ from the auction block. “This one’s given name was…”  
  
It looked up again.  
  
“…Yondu,” it finished, looking back to the not-Xandarian. It felt strange. It felt _right._  
  
Captain Ogord looked thoughtful.  
  
“Well, then, Yondu Udonta,” they said definitively, “welcome to the Ravagers.”


End file.
